Bright-Eyed and Bushy-Tailed
by starfishstar
Summary: Hermione's never stopped dreaming of inter-house unity. But these days she does more than just dream.


**Notes:**

For the prompts of: "Hermione Granger," "Minerva McGonagall," and "screaming" (from a ficlet activity at rs_games, though I joined the party too late for this to be officially part of that).

This expands on a bit of my own headcanon from my story "Chambers," but you don't have to have read that to read this!

. . . . .

**Story:**

"What did you say?" Hermione shouted over the hubbub of forty first-years all chattering excitedly over one another.

"What did you say?" Minerva McGonagall called back, before realising that she'd simply repeated Hermione's words.

The two women shared a rueful glance when they heard themselves. McGonagall nodded, indicating that Hermione should go ahead, so Hermione turned to the students assembled in front of them in the Great Hall in unruly clumps and gaggles, pointed her wand at her own throat with a quick murmured "_Sonorus_," and called, "Quiet, now! Your attention, please!"

The hubbub died down and forty young faces gazed up at Hermione, with expressions ranging from curious to bored, excited to baffled. McGonagall, Hermione knew, hadn't told them anything about what they would be doing today, only that it was the first day of a special project they would be pursuing throughout the school year.

Seeing that order now reigned, McGonagall slipped away, surely to see to other of her endless duties as headmistress. Hermione addressed her attention to the children in front of her.

"My name is Hermione Granger," she said, "and I work at the Ministry of Magic, in the Department of Magical Law Enforcement. Can anybody tell me what the Department of Magical Law Enforcement does?"

Right up front, a tiny little girl with her hair in two earnest-looking plaits bobbed on her toes, hand shooting into the air. Hermione smiled inwardly, and gave her own eleven-year-old self a gentle pat on the head.

"Yes?" she said to the girl.

"You make the rules that everybody has to follow," the girl said promptly, her hand still straining towards the hall's high ceiling, as if she'd forgotten to lower it again. "And then if people break the rules, you catch them."

Simplistic, but it would do for eleven-year-olds.

"Yes, very good," Hermione said to the girl, who smiled and blushed and finally remembered to put her hand down. "Now, how many of you think you might like to be an Auror someday?"

Throughout the room, hands shot up. Mostly boys, Hermione noted with an internal sigh.

"That's great," she said. "Aurors do a very important job. But there are lots of other important jobs in the DMLE, too, and today we're going to learn about some of them." She surveyed the children in front of her, knowing the reaction she would get as soon as she said her next words. "Now, I'd like you to form pairs…" – many of the students began drifting, almost unconsciously, towards their best friends – "…with someone who's in a different house from you."

Forty faces looked up at her with shock and confusion. Even after only little over a month at Hogwarts, the very idea was unthinkable.

Hermione smiled a little, and added, "Now, please. You can start by asking the person next to you what house she or he is in, if you don't know already."

Slowly, grudgingly, as if she'd asked them to wade through a pool of Grindylows, the students began to do as she had asked.

An hour later, pouring tea for them both in the Headmistress' Office, McGonagall asked, "How did it go?"

"Thank you," Hermione said, as her former professor handed her a teacup. Then, in answer to the question, "Very well. I love that moment where they realise their new partners are _not_ in fact alien creatures. And you can see it on their faces, that they know it, but they don't yet want to admit it." She sipped the tea, a flowery black tea blend that was soothing to her throat after an hour of speaking at a magically amplified volume.

McGonagall gave her a rare smile. "You do a good job at this, Ms Granger. I'm grateful you're still willing to take the time to come here and do this each year."

"You're grateful?" Hermione asked in surprise. "_I'm_ grateful."

It had started when Hermione came back to Hogwarts to complete her N.E.W.T.-level education, a year late, together with Ginny and Luna and the others who had previously been one year behind her. Hermione had been horrified to see how the four houses still approached one another with wary disdain, even after all they had been through, all the lives that had been lost for the sake of peace and an end to prejudice.

But Hermione had refused to despair; she'd convinced Professor McGonagall – newly Headmistress McGonagall – to let her start an extracurricular study club, with guest lectures from experts, to make up for some of the holes the war had punched in the past few years of their education. And the caveat had been – this last part had been Ginny's brilliant suggestion – that any students who wanted to participate in the club were required to attend together with a study partner from a different house.

And it had worked. Students came because they were worried about passing their N.E.W.T.s, but they stayed because they were actually learning something: from the Potions Master at St Mungo's, who led a master class; from the Deputy Head of the newly reorganised Auror Office, who provided an unforgettable hands-on lesson; from Andromeda Tonks, who gave what must have been the first history lecture at Hogwarts in decades that didn't put a single student to sleep.

And, quite by accident, the students made a few inter-house friendships along the way. The first time Hermione saw a Slytherin and a Gryffindor laughing together over a dumb mistake they'd made with their potion ingredients, Hermione nearly cried.

It wasn't much, but it was something. And when Hermione left school, she wondered why it should have to end. And, for that matter, why it should be limited to N.E.W.T.-level students, when those just starting their time at Hogwarts might in fact benefit more.

And thus the Hogwarts–Ministry of Magic Joint Enrichment Programme for First-Year Students was born, with Hermione overseeing a series of lectures and master classes held at the school throughout the year.

Now, she said to McGonagall, "Truly, Professor, thank you for letting me do this. I know I must have seemed terribly naïve at the beginning, but you let me give it a try, and I'm grateful."

Professor McGonagall studied Hermione over her spectacles, then nodded and said, "You're welcome."

Just then, there came the sound of students hollering outside in the hallway, at least three different voices raised in some sort of altercation.

McGonagall sighed and stood. Hermione stood, too.

"A headmistress' work is never done," Professor McGonagall said. "Would you mind if I asked you to see yourself out?"

"No, no, not at all," Hermione assured her. "And I'll have Harry contact you about when he'll come next month to give them the Auror demonstration."

McGonagall nodded. "Very good." She paused, then said, "It's always a pleasure to see you here, Ms Granger."

"Oh," Hermione said, surprised. "Thank you. It's a pleasure to be here."

McGonagall nodded once again, and went to see to her students. Hermione followed her out of the office, then made her way out of the castle, casting a last, fond look at the familiar corridors as she went.

Good old Hogwarts, still standing after all these struggles. And coming here and talking to the students of this new, post-war generation gave Hermione hope that it would continue to stand just like this for many years more.


End file.
